Welcome to Camelot
by Emachinescat
Summary: "A friendly medieval community where the sun is hot, the moon is beautiful, and dark magic passes overhead and under bed while we all pretend to sleep. Welcome to Camelot." A Merlin-themed parody of Nightvale. An experiment, in which the author has far too much fun playing in her sandbox.


Welcome to Camelot by Emachinescat

A Merlin and Welcome to Nightvale Crossover Fan-Fiction

SUMMARY: "A friendly medieval community where the sun is hot, the moon is beautiful, and dark magic passes overhead and under bed while we all pretend to sleep. Welcome to Camelot."

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**A/N: Longer A/N at the bottom of the story, if you're interested in my hiatus from fan-fic for so long.**

**So, this is actually not a new thing I'm posting. I was cleaning up one of my flash drives earlier and discovered this silly little nugget that I wrote a while back. I absolutely want to get back into writing fan-fic again, but until I can get something new written to post, I thought I'd go ahead and publish this in the meantime.**

**This may not make much sense to anyone who isn't familiar with the podcast "Welcome to Nightvale." This is essentially part of the first episode Merlin-ized, and I'm trying to also throw in a bit of commentary about the show and themes as well as playing with these two fandoms. I wouldn't really consider this a story so much as an experiment, and I may or may not continue it in the future, but I thought it was worth posting anyway, because when I read through it just now, it elicited a couple of unwitting smiles from me. Hopefully it will do the same for you.**

**Please let me know what you think. **

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**Welcome to Camelot**

A friendly medieval community where the sun is hot, the moon is beautiful, and dark magic passes overhead and under bed while we all pretend to sleep. Welcome to Camelot.

Hear ye, hear ye, peasants. To start things off, I've been asked to convey this brief notice: King Uther's council announces the opening of a new knight training arena on the outskirts of town, between that shady apothecary and the Darkling Woods. They would like to remind everyone that knights are not allowed in the knight training arena. Peasants are not allowed in the knight training arena. It is possible you will see cloaked figures in the knight training arena. Do not approach them. Do not approach the knight training arena. The surrounding wall is swarming with guards wielding crossbows and poisoned arrows, and is highly dangerous. Try not to look at the knight training arena, and especially do not look for any period of time at the cloaked figures. The knight training arena will not harm you.

And now the news.

New healer Alice out near the apothecary says the chimeras revealed themselves to her, said they were two feet long, poisonous, and one of them was face-meltingly ugly; said they helped her with various household chores. One of them replaced a wall sconce for her, the porch sconce. She's offering to trade for the old sconce, which has been touched by a malevolent magical creature. It was the ugly chimera, if that sweetens the stew for anyone. If you're interested, contact new healer Alice. She's out near the apothecary.

A new man came into town today. Who is he? What does he want from us? Why his perfect and beautiful haircut? Why his perfect flowing locks? He says he is a wanderer, a rogue. Well, we have all been wandering rogues at one point or another in our lives. But why now? Why here? And just what does he plan to do with all those flasks of ale and stinking pickled eggs in that tavern he's been lurking in – the one next to what used to be Tom's Blacksmith Shop? No one made a sword like Tom, rest his soul. No one.

Just a reminder to all the parents out there. Let's talk about safety when taking your children out to play in the Darkling Woods. You need to give them plenty of water, make sure there's a shade tree in the area, and keep an eye on other living things. Are they dirty, armed-to-the-teeth ne'er-do-wells? Probably bandits. Not a good area for play that day. Are they wearing armor with Camelot's crest but no cloaks? That's King Uther's Inner Circle. They'll keep a good eye on your kids, and hardly ever take one for healing quickly or not dying after falling off a tree branch. Are they hooded figures with light shooting from their fingertips? These are sorcerers, and no one knows just what terrible evil they want. Do not play in the area. Return to your home, and lock the doors until a guard from Uther's Inner Circle leaves blood of the most likely falsely accused on your doorstep to indicate that the danger has passed. Cover your ears to blot out the screams of, "_I'm innocent!_" Also, remember: the lower town's water supply is basically mud, so give your kids plain old mead, and maybe some apple slices when they play.

A dark sorcerer locked up in the dungeons disappeared today, only to reappear in the citadel's courtyard, disrupting an execution quite badly. The sorcerer wisped through the courtyard for only a fraction of a second, and before it could enchant any people or objects, it vanished again, this time apparently for good, taking the prisoner with it. There is no word yet on if or how this will affect King Uther's execution schedule, and also, if this could perhaps be the work of our bitter rivals Essetir. Essetir is always trying to show us up through fancier crests, better alliances with those in power, and possibly, by infiltrating Camelot with a powerful sorcerer, ruining a perfectly good execution. For shame, Essetir. For shame.

That new rogue wanderer we now know is named Gwaine called a town meeting. He has a strong jaw and teeth like the first snow of Yule. His hair is perfect, and we all hate and despair and love that perfect hair in equal measure. New Healer Alice brought tea, which was decent, but may possibly have been poisoned, and lacked cream. She said the chimeras had taken her cream for a hellish mission, and she hadn't yet gotten around to buying more. Gwaine told us that we are, by far, the most exciting kingdom in Albion, and he had come for adventures beyond anything a wandering rogue such as himself could dream of. He grinned devilishly, and everything about him was perfect, and I fell in love instantly. Masked travelers from vague, yet menacing corners of the Five Kingdoms were in the back, watching. I fear for Gwaine. I fear for Camelot. I fear for anyone caught between what they know and what they don't yet know that they don't know.

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**A/N: Again, this was more experimental than anything, but I sure had fun turning _Merlin_ into the weirdness that is _Nightvale _for a while. Hope you all enjoyed.**

**Anyway...**

**So, it has been literal months, well over a year, since I've posted anything here. My readers might assume that I've died. That's a fair assumption, though I am, as far as I can tell, not dead after all. I'm not going to bother with excuses. I'll just say that real life is something that loves to get in the way of writing fan-fiction. Between married life, teaching at two colleges, working on my own original novels, dealing with health issues, getting a Nintendo Switch, and watching WAAAY too much TV, I have been absent from fan-fic for far too long.**

**I got back into reading it a few months ago, lurking in the _Doctor Who_ and _MacGyver_ fandoms fairly anonymously, and then I started thinking about how much time I used to devote to fan-fiction, and I decided that I want to start writing it again. I will make no promises about when things will be updated, or what will be updated, only that I am going to try to write for at least 15-30 minutes a day, and to publish as I can. I miss fan-fiction.**

**Hope to hear from anyone who read this, whether you are a seasoned reader of mine or new. **

**I hope to post something perhaps a bit more substantial soon! ((I'm going to take a gander at where I left off on "This Cold Land" and try to dig up some inspiration. That fic is woefully unfinished. I am ashamed.))**

**~Emachinescat ^..^**


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